Florence Thorne Lake was born in Adelaide, South Australia, one of the eight children (another was adopted) born to Octavius Lake and Serena née Thorne. Six of the siblings did not survive infancy. Serena Thorne (1842-1902) was a preacher with Bible Christians in England. In June 1863, with her sister Sussana and brothers William and Ebenezer, she departed for Brisbane, Queensland, where she also preached. After three years she moved to Victoria and in 1870 to Adelaide where she married. Florence was born 2 September 1873.
Florence’s early years are quite unknown but the connection with Queensland was maintained as Lake returned to study with painter and craft-worker Ada Ellwood (Ada’s sister Jessie Ellwood taught wood carving at the Brisbane Technical College 1898-1902). She also studied in Adelaide with Will Ashton (1881-1963); though it is not known exactly when she studied with Ashton, it was most likely during the period between his European sojourns, 1905-12.
She was an associate member with the South Australian Society of Arts from 1916. In 1922 she visited England where she worked with Lamorna Birch and especially the watercolourist Wycliff Egginton (1875-1951) at his summer school at Dartmoor and later at his studio at Teignmouth, Devon. When she returned to Adelaide she exhibited landscapes of Teignmouth at the South Australian Society of Arts but the Society’s annual reveals that she soon settled in Sydney and was living at 219 George Street.
It appears that Lake visited Queensland on several occasions to connect with members of her extended family. In 1924, following her exhibition at the Society of Artists Gallery (Adelaide) in July she held an exhibition of her works at Exton’s Art Gallery in September (organised by Brisbane gallerist, Jeanette Sheldon) and also showed examples of her work at the Annual exhibition of the Queensland Art Society.
Lake apparently visited New Guinea as such subjects appeared in the paintings submitted to the Queensland Art Society in 1932. By 1936 she was living at Pomona, to the north of Brisbane. She also visited the mining town of Mt Morgan, the subject of several works in the 1938 Queensland Art Society exhibition and later at the Australian Watercolour Institute in 1940.
Lake was involved with the Australian Red Cross in Brisbane during World War II which probably saw the end of her exhibiting career. She died at a Methodist nursing home, Sydney in 1962.
- Writers:
- Cooke, Glenn R.
- Date written:
- 2009
- Last updated:
- 2011
